A neo-Baroque parish church from 1935-1939 in the Katowice district of Wełnowiec-Józefowiec.
The Church of St Joseph the Worker stands in the Katowice district of Wełnowiec-Józefowiec, at the junction of Józefowska Street and Profesora Mikusińskiego Street. It was built in 1935-1939 in the neo-Baroque style, and its silhouette is defined by the dome over the crossing of the nave and transept.
The residents of Józefowiec had sought a parish of their own since 1895. In 1919 a temporary wooden church was put up, built in 138 days. It was 32 metres long and 18 metres wide and had three altars, the main one decorated with an image of St Joseph.
Work on the brick church began in the spring of 1935. The foundation stone was blessed in October 1935, and the finished church was blessed on 12 November 1939. The designer was the Katowice architect and engineer Jan Kapołka. Construction proceeded in stages, paid for by the parishioners, and a gas-proof shelter for 250 people was set up in the building.
The church is of reinforced concrete, with a roof on an iron structure covered with tiles, and the helms of the tower and bell turret are covered with copper sheet. The plan is a Latin cross: the main nave measures 34 metres, the transept 23.5 metres, and the dome over the crossing reaches 17.4 metres. The nave and transept have the same width and height, 11 and 13 metres respectively.
Inside there is a gallery supported on two pillars and surrounded by a balustrade with oriels, and above the sacristy a chapel of St Maximilian Maria Kolbe. The stained glass depicts saints and symbols of the sacraments. On the gallery stands an organ bought in 1923 for the temporary church and later enlarged. Three bells hang in the tower: Józef, Florian and Barbara.
It is about 1.4 kilometres in a straight line from here to the Silesian Zoological Garden in Chorzów.
Nearby, about 1.9 kilometres away, lies the Silesian Park.
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